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Done far before better by others "Conspiracy of Fools" should have remained in the word processor. It is the third or fourth retelling of the Enron events, and it is far inferior to the description of events given in "The Smartest Guys in the Room" which was written closer to the time of the crisis by Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind from "Fortune" (Bethany McLean appears in CoF briefly). Where CoF falls down is in detailing the culture of arrogance at Enron: CoF leaves one with the impression that the major reason for the collapse of Enron was Andy Fastow and a few others being crooks, rather than examining Enron's addiction to MBA tricks in place of solid business understanding and realistic expectations of return on capital. Much of the book is spent detailing the mundane aspects of Andy Fastow's quest for personal gain at Enron's expense. While that was certainly a factor, his desire for personal gain would never have destroyed the company had the supposed 'culture of analysis' of McKinsey been in place, or even if someone had simply been paying attention to the business fundimentals. What Eichenwald does obviously have is more interviews with key players, so his backstory is often more interesting. I also don't think that Eichenwald does as good a job as McLean in showing the complicity of Arthur Anderson in what happened; Eichenwald seems to be saying that Anderson's failures were all due to David Duncan (the account manager for Anderson) not having a backbone, and that simply doesn't make sense. Eichenwald leaves out many interesting details so that he can have little vingettes with The Rich and Powerful (GWB, GHWB, Cheney, Schwarzenegger, Colin Powell, etc) that all go nowhere and thus seem included only to either fill space or create ominous connections (that are also unfulfilled). All-in-all, a disappointment after Eichenwald's previous book "The Informant". Too many trees died for this inferior retelling of the same tale. If you have to read it, at least read "The Smartest Guys in the Room" first, so you'll know how much Eichenwald left out.